Catching up!

Catching up – Dec/Jan

Meeting up with S, he chooses the one Italian option as opposed to four French ones.  This is Caraffini on Lower Sloane Street. There is an outside terrace, but that’s not suitable in December.

Inside is pretty much full. We get directed to a table, crammed in by a wine bucket, already full of other people’s wine. B complains, and reluctantly they do move it further away. And also we get our own wine bucket on the table for the Grillo at £38!

We say yes bread and olives, and then move on to starters. S has sardines, which look good; B has some odd pork rolls and I have prawns in garlic and chilli. For mains S has a very pink calves liver, B has scampi with asparagus, and I have lemon veal.

We go for some desserts – S had panna cotto and I have sgroppino (lemon sorbet, vodka and champagne).

Service has been good after the initial contretemps. As well as a second bottle of Grillo, we also a Barbera d’Alba at £48. 12.5% service takes to £340, but it has all been good.

 

We are staying at a hotel near St Pancras before an early start on a train to Bruges for Christmas. Having looked at the options, we settle on Supawan, a Thai place on the Caledonian Road. It’s pretty busy, so we get put into a smallish table sitting at 90 degrees. The décor is very unusual – not cliché Thai.

We order some prawn crackers while we order (large portion), along with Viognier at £35. For starters, we have grilled prawns on Betel leaves, with loads of tasty trimmings, ordering the extra portion as suggested to take it to two each. Excellent. Along with the inevitable soft-shell crab, quite meaty.

Main courses are stir-fried king prawns with lemongrass and garlic, and a spicy minced chicken dish, supported by a mound of jasmine rice.

All very good, with friendly service, but the prices did mount up. With a second bottle and 12.5% service we get up to £170, which seems a lot for a Thai.

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We meet up with E and J in Covent Garden for a visit to SushiSamba, and start off with edamame beans. The wine list escalates alarmingly – I manage to find a Vermintino for £49. We have a round of jumbo prawns, tuna ceviche, and soft shell crab roll. The J wants to order the trio of meats - rib-eye, chorizo, filet mignon – “Churrasco del Rio Grande”.  E has the mushroom dish.

We later have a bottle of red chosen by J who is insisting on paying, so I don’t know how much the bill came to – it won’t have been cheap.

Before heading off to Paris for a few days, we treat ourselves to a late lunch at Mem’s, our newish place locally. They do a 2 course fixed price lunch for £43, which like its predecessor has a limited range of dishes.

We’re offered canape drinks and an amuse bouche, both very nice. Their house Chenin Blanc is a very reasonable £28 a bottle.

I have the duck rillette (solid) and treat myself to a surf and turf for a £15 supplement. The “surf” is two large tiger prawns.  B has Bluefin Tuna tartare followed by venison loin.

I have a couple of glasses of Malbec (not so reasonable at £15 each), while B has another glass of Chenin.

All in all, £190 including 12.5% service, which has been fine – we are the only ones in there most of the time.

 

Meeting up with P&M. P wanted to go to the new Battersea Power station complex, so after some research we settled on Brindisa. It’s not as attractive a venue as the one in Richmond, though sitting outside in the summer it might be better.

We are there first, so get the better view. We order a white Rioja (Veltiver) for £36, which goes down well. B and I order the garlic prawns, chicken with mojo rojo (a red sauce from the Canaries), chorizo on toast with pepper and rocket (excellent) and Iberico pork cheeks with chocolate and rioja (very tender, but got cold quickly). P&M add more prawns, tortilla and patatas bravas. We also have bread.

We move on to a couple of desserts. P has the ice cream, while I go for the almond tart.

Four bottles in all, a slightly cheeky 13.5% service (it’s not been great) and that takes us just shy of £300 for the four of us. Not expensive, but I wouldn’t recommend it.

 

Before the theatre, we’ve chosen a Vietnamese place in Garrick Street called Com Viet. It’s nearly full on the ground floor, but we get a table by the window. There is a larger room downstairs, but they were still turning people away.

For starters we have soft shell crab (OK) and something called Com Viet Cha. This is minced pork and prawns, with mint and coriander leaves, that you wrap in dipped rice paper, which resembles a condom. Very messy, but the fresh herbs make it very tasty.

Mains are stewed pork belly (rather fatty to my taste, but B likes it) and wok-tossed duck breast with lemongrass and chilli. There a lot of wok-tossed options, a few seabass ones and not much else to choose from.

We have a bottle and two glasses of NZ SB (£51 together) – total £115 with 12.5% service.

B was pleased with it, but I thought the pork was a downside.

 

  

Return to Soho Vietnamese

 The plan is to meet E and her new squeeze before going to the theatre. But unfortunately he has to work late so it's just the three of us. As one of the options we suggested, E has booked us in quite early (5.30) for dinner at Cay Tre in Dean Street. We had been there some time ago with 131-ers and it's also a possibility for an upcoming reunion.

We arrive a bit early and are shown to our table, though we are warned the kitchen won't open for 10 minutes.  Before we are settled in, E joins us. It's a buzzy place and we are towards the back, where the group area would be. We order a bottle of Chilean SB at £32 and some sparkling water (£2). 

The menu is quite extensive, and includes many vegetarian dishes that will suit E. There's a whole page of pho. After a little discussion about a set seafood dish, we opt to stay with standard starters and mains. 

I have the crispy crab parcel to start. This is quite dense, including pork, prawn and mushrooms as well, but still tasting of crab. It's also very deep fried. B has the salt and pepper soft shell crab. This is a good size, recognisably crab-shaped. She is also impressed with the dressing that comes with it, fresh and bright. E chooses a mango salad with tofu. This seems quite small with not a lot of mango but she is happy with it. 

I'd been trying to decide between the chilli and lemongrass chicken and the "shaking" beef, and eventually settle on the latter. It comes as cubes of beef with fried peppers and onion, and a garlic sauce. The first few pieces are melt in the mouth, but a couple of the later ones had some gristle. B has "one bowl" vermicelli with prawns in chilli and garlic. There are plenty of prawns (shell on) and lots of flavour - she even eats lots of the vermicelli. E chooses the okra and aubergine curry, and we share some jasmine rice (which we don't really need). 

Service has been fine, they are used to rushing people through, so we get away in time for the show. It has been rather noisy, so not sure it's ideal for our group. Other tables have some huge bowls, much larger than B's, presumably the pho. With a second bottle of wine, the bill comes up just short of £180 (13% service again). It works as an interesting pre-theatre place, but not one for an intimate restful dinner.

Three recent excursions

 We're meeting up with T&K again, and after some deliberation have settled on El Pirata Mayfair, off Piccadilly, near Shepherd Market. We'd been a couple of times before, but it seems we also went with them after a wine-tasting - which we have no recollection of!

It's very busy again, and I give my name for the booking - only for T to point out he booked it, so is described by the waiter as "the fantastic Mr S" - but we are lucky to be shown to a table by the window. Even downstairs is pretty full - it is very lively. We do manage to flag down a waiter to order some wine - B and I have an SB "Inurrieta Blanco" (£31) while they have a red Tarima Organico (£30). 

We explore the menu and eventually settle on nine dishes plus some bread. In the end, the chipironnes (grilled baby squid with chickpeas stew) is "off",  First to arrive was the plate of 8 anchovies - only T and I tuck into those,  These were soon followed by the two croquettes dishes - ham and chicken - and the asparagus. Croquettes are fine, if not special, but the asparagus with tomato and manchego is really nicely cooked al dente. Next were the mussels and chorizo (small pieces) and two portions of gambas pil-pil (inevitably). Both really good - nicely charred garlic with the pil-pil. Garlic chicken and chorizo in red wine round off the order. The chorizo is good, but the garlic chicken a little dull, in a rather dark sauce. 

After a little pause, we order some more gambas and a plate of cheese, and re-order the bread which hadn't arrived. There are four different cheeses in the selection and it comes with quince jelly and little breadsticks. The garlic dip with the bread is also good. With this we have a second bottle of the red. 

Service is the increasingly common 13.5%. But they didn't charge us for the bread. So we end up with a total of £216. The waiters have been jolly and service pretty good for such a busy lunchtime. Very good lunch.

After a shopping trip to Kingston we head to a Vietnamese restaurant B had spotted online - Pho. This is part of a chain, with a dozen or so in and around London and others across the country.  When we get there - about 2pm on a Saturday - the place is heaving and it's not clear that we'll get a table. As the waitress goes to look, a small group comes in behind us and asks if we have a reservation, as they do. Well, you'll still have to wait. 

We get a table towards the back of the restaurant, near the back window, so quite pleasant. It takes a little while to flag down a waitress to order wine, but it comes fairly quickly after that - a French Viognier at £22.50. There's a very interesting range of starters on the menu - we order the pork meatballs, seafood spring roll and mango salad. But the mango salad is "off" so we have crispy squid instead.  We also order prawn crackers to keep us going.

The meatballs are very tasty, with lemongrass, and the peanut sauce we choose to have with it has a subtle kick that creeps up on you. The squid, as is often the case, is good while still hot, but looses its appeal a bit after that. They are small pieces, nicely cooked in thin batter, not at all rubbery, though I would have preferred garlic in the mayonnaise rather than lime. The spring roll accompanied by Vietnamese fish sauce is the least interesting despite apparently having king prawn and crab in it. The crackers don't appear at first, then the waitress tells us that they were hunting the store-room for sweet chilli sauce to go with them. Shortly later, the chef comes to tell us and the lads at the table next to us that they didn't have the sauce, but offered us a choice of ones he could do. The others choose the sriracha one, so we go with that too. It is very spicy indeed. 

The main course menu is dominated - appropriately enough - by pho dishes, though there are a few stir fries and curries too. B chooses the house version with prawns, chicken and steak, while I go for the steak and garlic one.  They are big steaming bowls of broth with loads of noodles, plus herbs to add to taste, to be eaten messily with chopsticks and a bamboo spoon. Not one for a first date.  The broth is excellent, and there is plenty of protein in both, though a couple of the pieces of steak in mine are rather tough. Far too many noodles to stand a chance of getting through them. 

With a second bottle of wine the bill comes to a bit over £100, including 12.5% service. The service has been good despite the unavailability of a couple of things, so I'm happy to fill in the feedback questionnaire at the end. An interesting lunch.

The following week we visit the Cezanne exhibition at Tate Modern. We're quite late so our favourite tapas nearby isn't open and our researches have not been very successful at finding anywhere else interesting. We settle on The Refinery, round the back on Southwark Street. It's a big place, but not very full when we arrive - though the waiter says they were busy earlier and are fully booked this evening. A good place for work groups I'd imagine - they do lots of cocktails. The wine list is fairly varied, but we just order the South African Chenin Blanc at £24. 

B fancies the venison scotch egg, but they don't have that, so we have the salt and pepper squid and the chicken skewers instead. The squid comes as quite a large portion, with lemon mayonnaise this time but it is rather rubbery.  The skewers come with "hot honey" - with a chilli kick - interesting, but rather too sweet. 

Main courses are crispy duck salad for B and chalkstream trout for me plus a side order of "Roman" fries, with parmesan and truffle. The salad is quite large, with a good amount of duck and a wide range of supplements - beansprouts, wonton and peanuts. But it is more crispy than duck. My trout though is very good indeed. Slightly undercooked perhaps, but with a lovely crust and lots of flavour.   

The service has been good and the music I think you might call "technobeat" - not too loud, though I'd guess it would be louder in the evening. We have a nice table by the window, so the feel has been good. Sparkling water and a second bottle of wine, a 50p charity donation and 12.5% service brings the bill to over £120. Probably the least good value of the three, but a reasonable enough option in an area surprisingly short on mid-range places. 

Return to the House of Ho

We’re meeting S and L again, and they like their cocktails. So we arrive at House of Ho, in Percy Street in time for happy “hour”, two for one cocktails from 5.30 to 7pm – we fall in with the doors.  We get through two rounds before heading down to the restaurant for dinner.  Only to be promptly told to go back up two floors!

Again, it’s one of those places where you can’t easily distinguish starters from mains – sorry, but I like a bit of structure – though we do crack it in the end.  We have some edamame beans and Vietnamese prawn crackers while choosing.

Up first we have popcorn shrimps, really tempting deep-fried little pieces, which B scoffs most of. The prawn summer roll in rice-paper wrap is good, the coriander leaves coming through. Crab and prawn wanton is a little more ordinary, and pulled pork slider doesn’t really work shared between four. 

Then “mains” do arrive.  My choice was the shaking beef, fillet with interesting spices, which is very tender as you’d expect.  S’s choice of green chicken curry is the largest portion, not too fiery but enough to make it good. L’s  king prawns with chilli and garlic comes, not as I expected stir-fried, but deep-fried  - but is nonetheless very good. B chooses the duck and watermelon salad, which is perhaps the best of the lot – light, fresh, tangy spice.  We also have noodles.

One bottle of wine (the other came down from the bar), takes the bill to a pretty modest £220.  Definitely a reliably good value venue.

Busy couple of weeks

It’s been a busy couple of weeks, with trips to several new places and some old favourites re-visited.  

IMPERIAL CHINA

G&S are down staying with us, so after the compulsory trip to our favourite local Vietnamese, Cat Ba Island, the next day we decide to go to Dishoom  in Upper St Martin’s Lane.   We’d tried to get in before but not been able to face the queue, so we think around 4pm on a Sunday afternoon should be OK.   I go ahead to grab a spot in the queue. As I approach it doesn’t look too bad, but when I ask the chap how long the wait will be, he says an hour! And 30 minutes before we even get inside to wait at the bar!! I don’t think so.

 So we decide on Chinatown for dim sum. Our previous favourite, Harbour City, has been taken over by New Loon Fung, but they too are full, with a half-hour wait. So we go round to Lisle street and into Imperial China.  This is an attractive place, tucked away in a courtyard, approached by a little bridge over a stream, by a waterfall and a pond full of huge koi carp. Chinese lanterns complete the look.

 The dim sum is a fairly standard selection of dumplings and rolls. But they are fresh, spicy and hot.  Service is friendly (for Chinatown!) and efficient. With three bottles of wine it comes to £180 for four.

 

CHEZ BRUCE

Next day the four of us went to Chez Bruce, probably our “go-to” favourite. The set lunch is £32 for 3 courses, which is very good value, though B was not impressed with a £6 supplement for the venison that both she and S had as main. The parmesan crisps were excellent as usual, and the service still very friendly and unstuffy, but we had a surprisingly long wait for our starters. My selection was duck tagliettelle (wonderful!) followed by  sea bream, and then their super vanilla créme brûlée . Wines at £26 for Viognier, £28 for Syrah (both Chilean). Total £287. Afterwards reflected on the fact that normally Michelin-starred places give you an amuse bouche, but apart from the parmesan crisps, there was nothing at Chez Bruce.  Still, it remains up there for us.

 

HOUSE OF Hô

B has booked us, with T&K,  into House of Hô after the Tesco wine tasting at Olympia. It’s only at the last minute we realise that it is not the place in Old Compton St we had been to before (which has now closed), but in Percy Street, Fitzrovia, on the site of Bam Bou, which we used to like.

There is an attractively priced set brunch menu available on a Saturday, but instead we decide to choose from the a la carte.  The menu is predominantly starters, sushi and sashimi, with just a few mains, so we treat it basically as dim sum.  The waiter explains that some of the dishes come with just three pieces, and offers us the chance to make them up to four to share.  I wonder if this is a sly trick to make more money, but to be fair when the bill comes the extra piece is charged pro rata. We have some edamame beans in chilli while we decide what to order.

First up come the skewered spicy prawns, and the chicken dumplings. The prawns have a good flavour, though are not that spicy, and the dumplings good but nothing special. Next come the duck spring roll (very good), and “imperial roll” (large) and some crab and prawn croquettes (excellent).  Then the Vietnamese scotch egg (interesting), duck and watermelon salad (quite large and tasty),  and spare ribs (falling off the bone) arrive.  We discuss whether we are full and decide we can manage some more. We order another duck spring roll and some prawn dumplings (good but more standard) for three of us, while K has a dessert – Asian banana crumble, which she says is wonderful.

Service has been good and attentive, and the place gradually filled up towards 4pm, giving it some atmosphere – the décor is not as dramatic as Bam Bou used to be.  Three bottles of Chilean SB at £28 each takes the bill up to just over £200 – given the quality of what we had, and how full we feel that seems pretty good.

 

THE CLOVE CLUB

M&G are generously taking us out for lunch, on behalf of M’s late mother, at the Michelin-starred Clove Club in Shoreditch – not an Indian as many people assumed.  We have a drink first in a quirky Shepherd Neame pub – the Prince Arthur – with a very chatty barman, who insists we look at the upstairs bar before we leave. There is a real fire, candles, and a strange mix of Regency cartoons and Gonzo prints on the walls.

Then on to the restaurant at Shoreditch Town Hall. It has a bar at the front but we get shown in to the main room at the back.  There is a huge brigade of staff, outnumbering the diners by two to one.  The chef featured recently as “young chef of the year” in the Observer food review – and looks about 14.

We opt for the five-course tasting menu at £65 (rather than the nine-course one!), with the complementary wine pairing at £50. But we start with some kir, champagne and a Bourbon cocktail.  We did though decide against the extra scallops course at £18.

The meal starts with a selection of “snacks” - iced beetroot with crème fraiche, crab tartlet (lovely), haggis balls (in a sweetish brioche-like bun, not as peppery as you might expect) and fried chicken in pine needles (“an up-market KFC” – much nicer).

The first course of the meal proper was tartare of hake which came with an Alsace Pinot from a magnum. The hake is an interesting idea but doesn’t taste of a great deal.  Next up is a soup course – three of us have opted out of the oysters.  Again, not that special.

The cod with beetroot and  fermented cabbage was more of a success - firm, tasty fish and some intriguing accompaniments.  I also liked the “main course” venison loin and venison sausage, though B was less impressed. 

We then opted for one portion of the extra cheese selection, which came with a Sauterne and a fino sherry.

Dessert courses were a delicate layered cream and ice cream pot,  and a rather sturdy tarte tatin – more of an English apple tart really, but good all the same.

Service was friendly and with such a big staff very efficient. The sommelier was chatty and knowledgeable.  Of the other customers, two were Silicon roundabout hipsters eating alone, four slightly older business types (still with beards), and a pair of elderly gentlemen.

As I said M&G were very generously treating us, so I don’t know the exact cost, but it must have been seriously expensive.  It had been a great experience, but at those prices I doubt we will rush back.

 

MARKET BRASSERIE

Meeting up with ex-BT colleagues, S and L, we decide to go to Shepherd Market for lunch.  Interesting French colonial African pictures on the walls.  Buzzy little place, with a strange porcelain head on one table – “watching over us” said the waiter.

L has the orecchiette with tomato and broccoli, and S the Atlantic cod (which looked like a small portion).  I go for the duck breast with Lyonnaise potatoes off the specials board – very good.  As S is off to a meeting we just have the one bottle of Chilean SB at £21.  Just under £30 a head in total including service. Not a “wow” place but pretty sound and handy to know of if you’re in the area (though of course there is plenty of choice around there).

 

DRAKE AND MORGAN, KING’S CROSS

K has stayed over with us after the party yesterday, so we go with her to King’s Cross to see her off back home. Pancras Square, round the back of the station, now has quite a range of eateries, but we settle on Drake and Morgan.

It turns out to be a huge place, done out in industrial chic, with exposed pipework.  It is pretty busy as we fetch up about 1.30pm on Sunday, but we have booked so that’s OK. We are shown to our table, miles away down the far end of the restaurant, overlooked by a huge picture of a grumpy cow.

Despite the waitress being attentive, our drinks take a while to arrive – Chenin Blanc (£18) and ginger smoothie for K.  For starters (which do arrive quickly) we have crispy squid (quite spicy) and ham croquettes (nice crispy exterior, but rather gooey insides). 

I had seen a Thai green coconut curry (with either chicken or prawns) on the website menu, but they’re not there on the day – maybe because it’s a Sunday, with roasts.  K orders the Waygu burger, but is told they’ve sold out, so she settles for a cheeseburger instead – very dense and filling. B has gone for a starter Cobb salad with chicken as main – specifically making it clear that she didn’t want a larger one. When it comes it is huge, but to be fair they only charge us for a small one - it would be far too much as a starter. I have the tuna with ginger and soy sauce, plus some chips – very good and pink, but a bit cold.

K has an espresso martini to follow, while we have a couple more glasses of wine.  £135 for three of us (2 bottles of wine) seems good value.

September to November

Round up – September  to November.

Hutong @ Shard:  As a party of 6, we were sat away from window – go in a smaller group. The set meal was disappointing – good monkfish and sweetcorn soup, followed by fair dims um; but badly let down by the main course. The deal was 9 dishes - a con, as that included the rice and it seemed the lettuce wrap.  And they were pretty ordinary – chicken and cashew nuts in the lettuce wrap, duck with rice.  We ordered 2 desserts between us, including weird black sesame dumpling. Others report the a la carte as good, so maybe give that a go. The wine list had suitably sky-high prices, so we had 4 bottles of rose @ £45, taking the £35 set lunch up to £80 a head

Senor Ceviche, in Kingly Court, off Regent Street: our second visit, was as good as the first but we had an almost identical choice of 6 dishes, as we wouldn’t have wanted the others. Free vegetarian slider (“sanguchitos”)  to begin (as they were new to the menu),  pork belly and mixed fried squid, prawn and cod; two ceviches, one salmon, the other sea bream and king prawn; chicken skewer and flat-iron steak.  First time we had black beans too,  All good, and very filling. With 2 bottles and 2 glasses of Sauvignon Blanc plus 12.5% service this comes to £122 for the two of us.

Da Mario, Endell St, Covent Garden: second visit to this homely Italian. All the classics done well, with fish specials. £300 for six including just 10% service added.

Bacco, Holborn. A more sophisticated Italian, but still very friendly service.  I had the tuna carpaccio and the pork belly, which were both good. 3 bottles of house wine at £19 between four of us took the bill to £200 including 12.5% - good value.

Riverside Cantonese, Cardiff:  it’s match day, and we’ve left it late to book, so we end up at this Chinese in a less than salubrious area.  I was very pleased and surprised to find it was a buzzing and smartish.  We had a selection of starters (missed the dim sum menu) and a couple of mains. £93 for two, with own choice of tip added.

Ben Thanh, Twickenham. Another match day but this time have booked early - only to find no-one else there when we arrive.  This small Vietnamese restaurant is fairly basic, but the staff were friendly and obliging. The four of us shared the platter to start – Vietnamese rolls, fried squid, pork and chicken satay.  The ladies had noodles with beef or chicken, while the chaps both went for Phô, the noodle soup – meatballs or king prawn.  The meatballs were not a hit, but the rest of the meal was good.  Three bottles of quite a nice NZ SB @ £17.80 took the total for 4 to just £110 before tip.

House of Hô, Old Compton St (website is the Percy St branch). Another Vietnamese and four of us again, but different friends this time.  Starters include soft shell crab and seafood ceviche; mains lemongrass chicken and shaking beef. Also two desserts and 3 bottles of SB at £24. With 12.5% this comes to £205 for four.  Much more sophisticated place, in centre of Soho, so maybe that’s fair enough.

 

November catch-up

I’ve got a bit behind with my reviews so here are a few quick comments on recent places we’ve been.

Cay Tre, Vietnamese restaurant in Dean Street. A group of 8 of us descended on the interesting place recently. It’s lively and buzzy, maybe a bit canteen-like, more suited to a group than a couple. Lots of unusual dishes on the menu, especially starters. My choices perhaps weren’t the best – chicken and prawn pancake followed by a noodle bowl . But others’ dishes did taste good. Definitely worth a try at under £100 for 2.

Cape Town Fish Market in Argyll Street is ideally positioned for shopping or the Palladium. Part of a SA chain with a good reputation, this branch doesn’t quite hit the spot. It’s attractive enough with a big fish tank, but the service was poor, and the food unexceptional.  The salt and pepper squid was ordinary, though the queen scallops in the shell attractive and nicely cooked. Fish “potjie” (spicy pot dish) was bland and the salmon teriyaki ordinary. At £79 with a bottle of wine, it’s not expensive for where it is – but we won’t be rushing back.

PJ’s in Wellington Street is an old favourite, a warm welcoming straightforward brasserie in Covent Garden. There were 6 of us for dinner – I had duck spring roll “shots” – 3 spring rolls with different sauces served in shot glasses – very good. Other starters were Arbroath smokie, Gorgonzola and fig tart, scallops and pancetta, merguez sausage and lobster and crab pate.  My main course tuna loin was just the right shade of pink, while others enjoyed chicken cordon bleu, lamb tagine and tuna Nicoise salad. With 3 bottles of wine this came to £83 a couple, but there was a 50% off food offer (which they do quite often) which saved us £70 overall.

A weekend in Cardiff to watch Wales v Australia (enough said) started with dinner at Woods Brasserie in Cardiff Bay. Set in a lovely old building, this restaurant is quite stylish and modern. There was a limited choice on the set menu, but a la carte available as well, I had scallops followed by duck breast – very nice. B had venison carpaccio then fish and chips; others had game terrine (very meaty) and pulled pork.  With 2 bottles of wine and a couple of glasses this was £140 for 4. I was impressed; B less so.

Finding somewhere for lunch on match day was always going to be a challenge, but S remembered a tapas bar they’d been to before - Ten feet tall in Church St, off St Mary’s St. Remarkably this wasn’t very busy at all, though we did have to sit outside. Tapas were 3 for £10 or 6 for £18, so we had spare ribs, chilli prawns, chicken pesto, belly pork, Serrano ham, and meatballs.   There were 4 pieces of each but they were rather small. Tasty though.  With wine at £13 bottle, a useful place to know for a quick lunch.

We’d pre-booked Pica Pica in Westgate Street for after the match – just as well as not surprisingly it was heaving.  There was a set rugby tapas menu for 4 available at £25 a head. This included pizza tostadas and patatas bravas, potato wedges, grilled mushrooms, bread and taboulleh was so was high on the carbs. Dates in bacon (nice idea), lamb kofta, piri piri chicken, meze platter, whitebait and chicken wings were also included along with a bottle of wine.  Not as elegant as lunchtime, but tasty.  Somewhat disrupted by someone rushing in from the bar area and stealing a lamb kofta from my plate!!